The National Rally (RN) met in La Rochelle on the occasion of its national council. At the end of this weekend, Le Pen spoke to the press about the upcoming municipal elections and said voters from the Républicains and La France insoumise should join hands with her party.
The President of the RN launched “an appeal to all Republicans who do not want Emmanuel Macron”. She said voters were seeing “the beginning of the decomposition of a traditional French political life” and should therefore come together to shape “a large municipal alternative force against LREM”.
Marine Le Pen also reached out to the disappointed of leftists from La France insoumise. Finally, the elected member of Pas-de-Calais indicated that the National Rally will have candidatures everywhere in France for the municipal vote.
As FranceInfo reported, Jordan Bardella, who led the list of the National Rally in the European elections, from which he emerged victorious, was promoted on Sunday as second vice-president of the party.
Félicitations à @J_Bardella pour son élection comme vice-président du Rassemblement National, qui vient couronner le succès des #Européennes2019. Tous mes vœux de réussite ! 💪🏻 MLP pic.twitter.com/5wkvaDrHQs
— Marine Le Pen (@MLP_officiel) June 16, 2019
The 23-year-old was elected to this position and to the executive board (party leadership) by the National Council. “The movement wants (Jordan Bardella) to invest and take responsibility (…) with regard to the immense talent that is his, and we saw it during the European campaign, with regard to his energy, his enthusiasm and youth,” said the mayor of Fréjus (Var) and member of the executive board, David Rachline, on the sidelines of this meeting.
The vice-president of the RN Steeve Briois, mayor of Hénin-Beaumont (Pas-de-Calais), was elected as first vice-president of the party.
According to an Odoxa poll released on May 30 for French weekly L’Express, the popularity of Jordan Bardella has exploded after the results of the European elections. Some 18 pecent (+10 points) of the respondents say that they feel sympathy for the young MEP.
On the occasion of this national council, the spokesman of the National Rally (RN), Sébastien Chenu, rejected any idea of a policy of quotas on immigration, a notion advanced by Interior Minister Christophe Castaner, because, according to him, it “does not work” in France.
As a reminder, the purpose of the CN meeting was to launch the RN campaign for the March 2020 municipal elections, where the party plans to strengthen its presence in order to win departments and regions the following year.